China has staged what’s being described as its largest military exercises around Taiwan to date, featuring live-fire drills and rocket launches into waters north and south of the island. The message isn’t subtle: these are not just maneuvers—they’re a demonstration of reach, coordination, and the ability to pressure Taiwan from multiple directions at once.
The geography matters. By firing into waters on both sides, China signals it can shape the air-and-sea picture around Taiwan in a way that resembles encirclement—not necessarily an invasion rehearsal every time, but a demonstration of options that would complicate civilian travel, shipping routes, and Taiwan’s military response.
Live-fire activity also raises the risk temperature. It compresses decision time, increases the chance of accidents or miscalculation, and forces nearby militaries and airlines to treat the drills as operationally real, not rhetorical.
For Taiwan, the immediate challenge is balance: mobilize and monitor without creating an incident. For the region, the larger concern is normalization—if drills of this scale become routine, the baseline level of tension rises, and a true escalation could be harder to distinguish from “just another exercise.”
In short: these war games aren’t only about what China can do. They’re about what everyone else must now plan for.
